God's own Dark Waters?
How the Environment Agency hamstrung investigations into PFAS contamination
In the second part of this exclusive investigation, ENDS’ Pippa Neill reveals just how record levels of PFAS pollution have been found in the town that is home to a ‘global leader’ in firefighting technology, while the Environment Agency hamstrung local authority investigations - and provided PR advice
Photos: Rob Whitrow
Series Editor: Tess Colley24 May 2024
How the Environment Agency hamstrung investigations into PFAS contamination
Usually, about once a week, residents of the pretty Yorkshire town of Bentham are subject to rolling black smoke emanating from a factory complex at the heart of the town. This practice has been a blight on the community for years, with one resident describing the smoke to ENDS as being “thick black, very, very dense, and weighty”.
That’s because normally, about once a week, Angus Fire tests new foam products to see if they are able to extinguish a fuel fire.
The company – which says it has the approval of regulatory authorities to ignite fires, and tries to keep them to a minimum – began producing PFAS fire fighting foams in Bentham in the 1970s, right up until 2022, when it produced 18,522.33 tonnes of the substance.
According to an Environment Agency (EA) site summary report obtained by ENDS, this equates to Angus Fire having handled an estimated 55.56 tonnes of PFAS chemicals that year.
But regulatory oversight has been inconsistent at best - and dangerous at worst - with this investigation revealing evidence of the EA having withheld information from a local authority which would have enabled it to carry out an investigation of potential PFAS contamination of private drinking water supplies far quicker than it was able to. The EA has refuted this claim.
The EA obtructs investigation into drinking water pollution
In February 2023, reports emerged in the media about PFAS hotspots across Europe, which included publicly available EA testing results of groundwater in Lancashire - downstream of Bentham. According to emails obtained by ENDS via freedom of information (FOI) requests, the reports prompted a concerned resident to ask Lancaster City Council for more information about potential drinking water contamination in the city. In the course of looking into this request, email correspondence shows that the council’s attention was soon drawn to Angus Fire.An officer from Lancaster City Council contacted the EA to state that as the “regulator for private water supplies within Lancaster, and following a discussion with the [Drinking Water Inspectorate (DWI)], it is understood that we need to carry out a risk assessment of our area to consider whether this may be an issue locally for private water supplies”. “We do not currently test for these chemicals as part of the Private Water Supply Regulation”, the officer wrote, adding that if the result reported in the media is correct, then “this may seem on first reading to indicate there may be an issue that does need consideration and a response”.
Ahead of a planned meeting on 28 March, Lancaster City Council emailed the EA asking for more information about PFAS contamination in the region.
“Our data is already public”, the EA said, pointing the council to the Water Quality Archive database, but adding that the exact test site locations of any samples have been withheld.
The EA added that while PFAS hotspots in groundwater are “fairly common”, there are “unusually high levels at Angus Fire”.
After the meeting, the council asked the EA to share these test locations.
In order to "undertake a best as possible [risk assessment], we will really need to know the correct locations”, an officer wrote.
After receiving no response, the council emailed the EA again, asking it to “come back to us as soon as possible re the data”.
In order to "undertake a best as possible [risk assessment], we will really need to know the correct locations”, an officer wrote.
After receiving no response, the council emailed the EA again, asking it to “come back to us as soon as possible re the data”.
The EA later confirmed that the council’s request had been logged as an environmental information request - the same type of request mechanism the public and press can use to obtain environmental information from public bodies. This gave the EA 20 working days to respond.
However, when the council received a response over a week later, the request had been refused.
However, when the council received a response over a week later, the request had been refused.
“It is government policy not to publish exact locations of potable water sources”, the response said.
God's own Dark Waters? How the Environment Agency hamstrung investigations into PFAS contamination
The council officer continued to say that “given the identified use of data (a statutory duty to protect public health) we consider the release of data in full to us in the public interest”.
Months on, it would appear there was no change. In an email sent later that summer on 21 August, Lancaster’s lead officer responsible for pollution prevention control said the council was “still in the position of not knowing whether there are private water supply contamination implications as a consequence of emissions from Angus”.
They wrote that “the operation/activities are currently ongoing with no real certainty [as to] when the use of PFAS chemicals will cease” and that there was still uncertainty around “the risk presented by imported replacement chemicals” - which even if not made at Angus Fire at that time, the council was advised “may still be tested” there.
As a result, the officer concluded that “the continuing impact needs focussed attention to stop continuing impacts wherever possible and as soon as possible”.
“Should off-site contamination be identified (which as PFAS has been found in onsite groundwater I would surmise is likely to some degree), I am guessing this should now be a priority action for Angus/the permit?”The EA has told ENDS that despite initially refusing the council’s request, it later provided the location data under a specific licence to ensure the locations could not be published to a resolution more detailed than 1km2 in order “to protect the security of public water supplies”.
Lancaster City Council told ENDS that it subsequently took water samples from two private supplies at residences in Tatham, Lancaster.
It said it “did not find any PFAS at these locations”.
Sampling from one of these locations conducted in January 2024 found a PFAS sum of <62 ng/l in the drinking water on the site.
A spokesperson for Lancaster City Council, said: “As a local authority we are responsible for private water supplies and the general emerging risk of PFAS led us to conduct district-wide risk assessments into potential sources.
“Industries involved in the manufacture of fire-fighting foams are associated with PFAS, and due to Angus Fire’s location, we sampled private water supplies in proximity to our boundary as a precaution.
”The council added that it had not found PFAS in any private water supplies within its district nor any which have an elevated risk of contamination.
“As part of this process we requested the information around the Environment Agency’s sampling within our district to benefit our own district-wide risk assessments,” it said.
Permit breaches
While the issue of whether Angus Fire’s legal permit to discharge contaminated water was fit for purpose was raised last summer, ENDS can also reveal that a few months later in October, the firm went on to breach its environmental permit - resulting in unpermitted discharges of PFAS to the environment.ENDS has obtained an EA report which followed a routine inspection of the Angus Fire site in March 2022.
It stated that officers had found “evidence” which appeared to show that liquids had escaped from one of the lagoons, either by overtopping, or by a breach in the liner.
The officers theorised that the liquid was coming from a drainage channel which leads to one of the lagoons, and Angus Fire was told to investigate this as a “matter of urgency”.
This incident was deemed to be a category three breach of the site’s environmental permit - these are associated with events which have a “minor impact” on human health, quality of life or the environment. Breaching a permit is an illegal offence under regulation 38 of the Environmental Permitting Regulations.
Nine months later, in December 2022, the EA carried out a ‘remote inspection’.
Officers noted afterwards that work to replace the lagoon liners and to address the pollution issue was ongoing.
However, when the EA next visited the site on 29 June 2023 - more than a year since the issue with the contaminated lagoons was first identified - the officers told Angus Fire they were “not satisfied that you have demonstrated that the lagoons are fit for purpose and also do not present a risk of causing groundwater pollution”.
They also said they were not satisfied that the new lagoon liners had been designed by “sufficiently competent persons so as to ensure adequate containment and pollution control”.
As such, the EA said it was “minded” to suspend its permit, “insofar as [Angus Fire is] allowed to continue to use the lagoons”.
However, because the agency said this “may have a significant impact” on business, the EA gave the firm the opportunity to submit an action plan and complete any necessary remedial work.
After informing Angus Fire that the agency was planning to suspend its permit, an EA regulatory officer wrote to the company in an email obtained by ENDS, which shows the agency offering to “talk over” the inspection report with them.
The EA officer replied that “having recently worked in the private sector I understand your position”, but explained that the problem with the lagoons means there is an “increased risk of fluorinated hydrocarbons [PFAS] being released to sewer. ”They continued: “The lagoons are in place to manage site effluent which is a potential contaminant.
You say that the lagoon liner has been replaced like for like. It has not been built to a recognised standard nor by a person of appropriate qualifications. ”Indeed, an EA inspection report seen by ENDS notes that officers believed that “the newly installed under-lagoon drains provide a pathway for emission to sewer of fluorinated species that may give rise to pollution”, adding that the agency “are not aware of any appropriate measures that have been taken to prevent or minimise such emissions”.
Angus Fire, however, told ENDS that its wastewater lagoons “have been managed to ensure no off-site release of PFAS”, adding that “in the event that any water overflows the lagoons, due to heavy rainfall, it remains on-site via a closed loop drainage system, as validated by the recent testing undertaken by the EA.
So we do not agree that water overflowing from the lagoons would get into the sewer system”.
A spokesperson added: “Angus Fire manufactures a wide range of fire-fighting products that protect life. The company has not breached any environmental permits in relation to PFAS.
We continue to work closely with the EA comply fully with EU regulations and UK laws, and remain committed to these standards.
”ENDS understands that the permit was never suspended.
A spokesperson for the agency said: “We are currently reviewing Angus Fire’s environmental permit in relation to PFAS. We will continue to assess any risks associated with the historic presence of these chemicals, including potential contamination.”
EA offers reputational management advice
Despite Angus Fire’s failures to comply with its permit, and the evidence obtained by this investigation that EA officers were fully aware of the risk of PFAS contamination from the site, in August 2023, the EA emailed Angus Fire to probe whether given the “increase in public awareness” of forever chemicals, the company may want to “engage in some form of public consultation in the future if attentions turn in your direction”.
“It is good practice to be prepared for all eventualities and [to] have considered some of the types of questions and issues that may arise with increased scrutiny from the public and press. Being prepared will allow you to actively portray the company in a light you see fit and not be caught on the back foot”, the email said.
‘I just assumed that as a government agency, that our tax money pays for, they would be keeping an eye on the environment’
God's own Dark Waters? How the Environment Agency hamstrung investigations into PFAS contamination
Anne Verhagen, a solicitor and member of the River Wenning Campaign Group, is stunned when she sees these emails. “I believed that as an agency, they are supposed to be looking after the environment on behalf of the people of the country. And they have clearly let us down here. I think that’s what I find really outrageous, and that quotation, urging them ‘not to be caught on the back foot’, what a term to use”, she says in astonishment.“This would suggest to me that the EA has really no intention of doing anything else. I just assumed that as a government agency that our tax money pays for, they would be keeping an eye on the environment and ensuring that people that may be emitting harmful substances are doing things as per the rules, as the law provides.” Legal pollution While the EA’s response to Angus Fire’s permit compliance has raised alarm, so has its approach to managing the firm’s permitted - that is, legal - discharges.Up until 2020, during the testing of firefighting foams, contaminated water runoff was directed to two onsite wastewater lagoons. Under a discharge permit by United Utilities, this contaminated water was then directed to the sewer. An EA site summary document notes that in 2017, when Angus Fire transitioned away from using longer-chain C8 foams, a class of PFAS which includes the now banned PFOA foams, “extensive testing and product development took place” on the use of shorter-chain C6 PFAS foams, with this suspected to be a “major release point for PFAS from the site”. The EA wrote that once the hazards associated with PFAS were understood by Angus Fire, the run-off was collected and sent for incineration. Angus Fire staff told the EA that this “may have been about three years ago, so potentially 2020”. Although Angus Fire stopped sending the contaminated water to the lagoons in 2020, the lagoons - which EA communications with the firm suggest still contain legacy contamination - continue to be permitted to discharge to the sewer. In the minutes ENDS has obtained of a meeting between Angus Fire, the EA, and Lancaster City Council, it is noted that this contaminated water may even “discharge directly to a stream”.
It was last year that Lancaster City Council raised concerns with the EA about this permitted discharge.In a letter sent in May 2023, a council officer wrote that they are “not professing to be an expert” but they “would not consider” the discharge of water from the lagoons to the sewer to “represent [best available techniques (BAT)] in terms of controlling or minimising pollution.”
“I would therefore suggest this need[s] real consideration given that releases may still potentially [be] ongoing from this part of the process” they wrote.The officer said that the permit seems to require Angus Fire only to “minimise releases to land and water, rather than prevent/manage to prevent them.
This would as far as I understand not enable effective regulation of this aspect? ”They added that the provisions or conditions in the permit around general on-site containment of liquids to prevent emissions to land and water “need review”, and suggested that United Utilities should be contacted regarding any “not professing to be an expert” but they “would not consider” the discharge of water from the lagoons to the sewer to “represent [best available techniques (BAT)] in terms of controlling or minimising pollution.”
“I would therefore suggest this need[s] real consideration given that releases may still potentially [be] ongoing from this part of the process” they wrote.The officer said that the permit seems to require Angus Fire only to “minimise releases to land and water, rather than prevent/manage to prevent them. This would as far as I understand not enable effective regulation of this aspect?”
They added that the provisions or conditions in the permit around general on-site containment of liquids to prevent emissions to land and water “need review”, and suggested that United Utilities should be contacted regarding any discharge to the sewer.
As the utility company is “currently unable/set up to treat PFAS substances they should be made aware and consulted on what is acceptable/permissible for a discharge to sewer,” wrote the council officer.
The email added that given PFAS contamination of groundwater has been detected “it would seem appropriate that the permit should now require off site testing”. “I noted from the site visit that housing existed in relatively close proximity to the site (particularly the test area and lagoons)”, they wrote. It is the role of water companies to enforce the trade effluent consent applications that companies require to discharge to a sewer. Commenting, a United Utilities spokesperson said: “Wastewater treatment processes are not designed to remove PFAS and there are currently no permit standards for PFAS in treated wastewater.
“We are supporting the UK Water Industry Research Chemicals Investigations Programme to better understand the sources of PFAS and how they are entering wastewater networks as well as watercourses.
These substances are widely used in society and a national plan will be needed to reduce their domestic and commercial use.”
Redundant ‘recommendations’
Angus Fire now only tests PFAS-free foams in Bentham, with testing of PFAS foams believed by staff to have halted “at some point in 2022”.
As of an update on the firm’s website earlier this month, the company has also stopped selling PFAS foams, offering fluorine-free firefighting foams instead.
However, until this update, Angus Fire said on its website that it continues to sell “modern” short-chain C6 PFAS foams, describing them as having “low toxicity” and stating that they “do not bioaccumulate”.
While selling these foams is legal, the claim that they do not bioaccumulate is contested, with the Health and Safety Executive (HSE) having noted that “short-chain ionic PFAS are considered more mobile, are more likely to be present in water compartments and have a greater potential to bioaccumulate (via protein driven mechanisms) in air breathing organisms”.
In an email sent to Angus Fire on 12 January this year, the EA warned that as the firm transitions to fluorine-free foams, there may be “an increase in the risks associated with decommissioning, decontamination and remediation”.
Angus Fire also has its own borehole, which ENDS revealed in part one of this investigation is known to be contaminated with PFAS. Under an environmental permit granted by the EA, the water from this borehole, which was used for cooling processes until July 2023, was then discharged directly into the river Wenning.
This permit, which was granted in 1991 and is still live, does not mention PFAS.
In a document seen by ENDS, the EA said that this discharge is therefore “likely to have exceeded the freshwater EQS” for PFAS.
In 2021, the EA “recommended” that Angus Fire sample this discharge.
However, it was confirmed in an inspection document two years later in July 2023 that the firm had “not acted upon this advice”. “This is a shocking case not only of environmental pollution but also of the reckless endangerment of human life,” said George Monbiot, author, journalist and environmental campaigner, commenting on ENDS' investigation. “The EA’s role in the cover-up suggests that its capture by the industries it is supposed to regulate has advanced even further than many of us had feared.” He added that as a result of “years of inaction and official negligence, the pollution by dangerous and persistent chemicals and the risk to both ecosystems and human health has spread far and wide”.
“I congratulate the ENDS Report on uncovering this disgraceful scandal.
Now we need urgent government investigation, action, compensation and restoration. Yet again, I find myself asking, ‘what were they thinking?’”
A permit is not necessarily a ‘get out of jail free card’
For Claire Nevin, a barrister in public, environmental, and planning law at Francis Taylor Building, just because a site is allowed to discharge effluent into the environment under its permit, it may not necessarily be the case that the operator is exempt from the law. “We have these scenarios where the actual fact of discharge is prima facie lawful because it's under a permit that has been granted by the EA, but I think currently there is somewhat of a regulatory gap in terms of how tightly those permits monitor control levels of PFAS”, she said. “The science on PFAS has been emerging for quite some time, so I think we’re arriving at a point where ignorance on the level of PFAS or the health risks is not really tenable anymore”.
“I think the mere fact of having a permit doesn’t mean that you can undertake the activities that are granted under that permit in any way you see fit”, Nevin explains. “I think just because you have a permit it doesn’t mean you can create a nuisance or health risks, it’s not a complete get out of jail free card.
”Nevin pointed to some cases which have shown this, pointing to the example of a case in 1996 in which sewage discharges that were permitted under permits - so even though prima facie lawful - were held by the court to be creating a statutory nuisance.
‘People have a right to know if their neighbourhood is contaminated with toxic chemicals’
Commenting on the investigation, Dr Shubhi Sharma, scientific research assistant at campaign group CHEM Trust said: “It is extremely shocking that these chemicals have been allowed to pollute this area and that the EA failed in their duty to protect the environment. People have a right to know if their neighbourhood is contaminated with toxic chemicals.
The more we look the more we find PFAS pollution scandals. The UK government needs to follow the example of the EU and ban this group of chemicals to protect people and nature now and in the future.”
Sitting having lunch in Bentham with Leonie Pearce - another member of the River Wenning Group - and her husband Dave at their house just outside Bentham, she tells ENDS that the revelations are “sickening”. Leonie has been researching the health of the river for many months, and says that 100 years ago, the river Wenning was one of the “foremost sea trout rivers”.
“You don’t see fish that often at all anymore”, she says, adding that it’s got to the point where you can “probably count on your hand the number of mature fish in one season that a fisherman would see”.
But she had never heard about chemical pollution. “I don’t know whether people kept silent because it’s important to the local economy”, she speculates.
Almost every Benthem resident ENDS spoke to for this investigation has expressed caution about speaking out, worried about a potential backlash from speaking about what is still a big employer in the area.
“People might think they’re being disloyal to the community, you know, by drawing attention to something that might close a source of income down because being a small rural market town, not in a particularly wealthy area of the country, we are dependent on local industries like Angus to provide work for local people if they want to stay in the area.
”She says she just “trusted that everything was under control.” “It's extremely worrying. It's kind of sickening really, that clearly people in a position to do something to stop the pollution have not acted when they should have done.
This is going to affect a whole community, a small town of people, who love the environment, but want to stay healthy as well.
”Commenting on ENDS investigation, the Environment Agency said: “We strongly refute these claims - we have worked closely with relevant local authorities and have provided them with the information they need.
“We take the risks posed by contaminants very seriously – which is why we proactively publish and share our environmental monitoring data with local authorities to assist with their risk assessments and to help inform any action they take to regulate the private water supply in their area.“We are currently reviewing Angus Fire’s environmental permit in relation to PFAS.
We will continue to assess any risks associated with the historic presence of these chemicals, including potential contamination.”An Angus Fire spokesperson said: “We no longer manufacture or test any PFAS-containing foam products at Bentham, or anywhere else in the world.
The business is focused on developing environmentally-friendly products, including JetFoam, the world’s first ever fluorine-free firefighting foam capable of extinguishing aviation fuels.
“We have played a significant role in our local community in North Yorkshire for 100 years, and it’s hugely important for us to maintain our positive relationships with the people of Bentham, and to play a responsible role in village life.
As Bentham’s biggest employer, we actively address all concerns related to local environmental impact and compliance.
“We are committed to continuous improvement in our operations, transparency, and working collaboratively with regulatory bodies to protect public health and the environment.”